Thursday, June 07, 2007

Uh-oh. Bad news, guys. I know we were getting all excited about The Dark Is Rising movie coming out. I mean, Walden Media's doing it, but they were so nice with Bridge to Terabithia that we were willing to forget about what they did to How To Eat Fried Worms. Well, we shouldn't have. In this woeful rehash of the book-to-film translation (I guess the misspelled Newbery Award in the first sentence should have been a tip-off) we learn that Cooper's novel has had a couple nips and tucks here and there. It reads:

But within those broad story strokes are major changes, including much more action than Cooper ever imagined, changed relationships and motivations, including the addition of a love interest for The Walker (who is much younger in the movie) and a new reason for him to betray the Light, a very different take on Merriman (in the books he’s essentially Merlin; screenwriter John Hodge told me they dropped all the Arthurian stuff from the film), new abilities for The Rider, and plenty of adventure elements – the impression that I got from what we saw was Indiana Jones meets Harry Potter.

Oh. I will rewrite that one for you so that you feel the full weight. It said, "the addition of a love interest for The Walker". In their defense, Christopher Eccleston is hot as hell. So.... there's that. Then my eyes drift back over the sentence and I shudder in the very depths of my soul.

And they're dropping the Arthurian stuff? Dude, when your poster looks like this

do you think it's the brightest idea to drop all connections to the essential mythology of the book? I mean, what if this movie's a hit and you want to remake the other titles in the series? How's that whole Grail/talking to the friggin' son of Arthur himself idea gonna work out for you?